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Steve
Bentschneider had a challenge.
In the manufacturing business since
1966, Bentschneider says that he had always noticed the amount
of clerical time spent on job tracking and manual timecards.
However, his company, Labor Aiding Systems (LAS) in
Jackson
,
Mich.
was experiencing inaccurate billing and employee accountability
problems.
“We
were inaccurately billing jobs and losing money,” he said.
“We never knew when employees were getting in and out. There
needed to be a better way to do it.”
Needing
to eliminate the hassles and inaccuracy of manual data entry and
employee accountability, Bentschneider began searching for a
solution.
“I’ve been around
since the pre-computer days,” Bentschneider says. “We’d
always spend at least an hour a day on time cards and job
tracking. That turns into 10-15 hours a week that you’re
paying someone to do this – and it’s not always accurate.”
Tracking
jobs as time and materials, Bentschneider said that all too
often someone walks away unhappy – either the customer or the
manufacturer.
“The
customer needs to see accurate documentation and know exactly
what he’s paying for,” he said. “And, any inaccuracy can
mean that we charge less than we should.”
It
was about three years ago that Bentschneider began looking
seriously at getting software to address this challenge – but
he found out there wasn’t anything out there.
“I
couldn’t find anything made for tool shops. Nothing to
pin-point the problem,” he said. “The only software out
there was just for production and cost up to $25,000. There
needed to be a viable way for people to track everything in
their shop.”
Not
being able to find anything that addressed this issue,
Bentschneider looked into creating his own software – Job Shop
Manager. Having used the software at LAS now for more than two
years, he says that it is both reliable and easy to use. “It
works well. Our output has gone up 10 percent with no increase
in labor cost,” he said. “It lets you monitor ...
...Continued
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